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Changes in DFW's LPTV market

KNAV's CP is good until at least December 2, but their last silent STA just ran out (on 1/19) - if their digital transmitter still isn't ready, maybe they decided to fire up the old analog transmitter (it's still licensed) rather than filing a third one. I'm not sure you're even allowed three consecutive silent STAs.

Hard to believe their digital transmitter still isn't ready though. They've been working on it since at least 2010.
 
A station is only allowed to go without broadcasting for 12 months before the FCC cancels the license, so that's a maximum of two 6-month STAs. I'd expect HOT on 22 to be gone within a few days - sounds to me like they're just trying to keep the license active.
 
dhett said:
A station is only allowed to go without broadcasting for 12 months before the FCC cancels the license, so that's a maximum of two 6-month STAs. I'd expect HOT on 22 to be gone within a few days - sounds to me like they're just trying to keep the license active.
Click to expand...

I noticed that station the other day when I was rescanning my TV. I was wondering what they were doing.
 
Bob E. Nelson said:
tested said:
And here it is I quit looking for analogs when I did a re-scan yesterday. Will have to try that tonight.
Click to expand...

I'm curious to see what the "usual suspects" here report with the reception. More than 3-1/2 years after the transition, it's almost like seeing something new when an analog reappears after a long absence.
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It's pretty snowy at my location (about 30 mi. ENE of the transmitters); not nearly as easy on the eyes as the digital versions on 26.1 or 31.3 ;) Audio was clear, although that's to be expected since analog audio is FM.

A new Antennas Direct preamp advertising a 1.8 dB UHF noise figure should arrive Friday. If channel 22.0 is still on the air this weekend, I'll see if that makes a noticeable difference.
 
Bob E. Nelson said:
tested said:
And here it is I quit looking for analogs when I did a re-scan yesterday. Will have to try that tonight.
Click to expand...

I'm curious to see what the "usual suspects" here report with the reception. More than 3-1/2 years after the transition, it's almost like seeing something new when an analog reappears after a long absence.
Click to expand...
Not bad here in FB. Completely watchable. A little airplane fading, maybe a trace of multipath, some random noise, all the old analog artifacts on display.

The sig meter on my TV doesn't work on analog stations so no numerical reference. Looking at 31.3 I receive an "85" (same as 13.1 KERA btw, which doesn't say much for KERA's signal.)
 
Megapsycle said:
Looking at 31.3 I receive an "85" (same as 13.1 KERA btw, which doesn't say much for KERA's signal.)
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On the old CM-7777 preamp, I had the same experience. According to Bob Nelson the problem is KERA is on RF 14, so their mask filter has a very sharp cutoff at 470 MHz, which degrades their signal. Channels 26, 28, 31, etc. are much weaker but don't have that handicap.
 
JHBrandt said:
Megapsycle said:
Looking at 31.3 I receive an "85" (same as 13.1 KERA btw, which doesn't say much for KERA's signal.)
Click to expand...

On the old CM-7777 preamp, I had the same experience. According to Bob Nelson the problem is KERA is on RF 14, so their mask filter has a very sharp cutoff at 470 MHz, which degrades their signal. Channels 26, 28, 31, etc. are much weaker but don't have that handicap.
Click to expand...

The CE of WCMH in Columbus, OH and I have communicated about the sharp filtering due to the land mobile protection. They run just shy of a megawatt, non-directional but on many sets show a signal quality value less than other facilities, with comparable power/HAAT in their market.

But when all is said and done, once the MER is sufficient to achieve a lock, the numbers are meaningful only to we geeks.

I do have to add that the recent return of a analog in the market is an object lesson of just how effective a digital signal can be. As Mr. Brandt mentioned elsewhere, an A/B comparison between KNAV and KODF is quite stunning. At our distances, you can readily see that KNAV isn't a full power facility. Yet, a little 15 kW LD looks as good as the big boys that are using 480i.
 
Receiving excellent signal from KNAV 22 in Decatur. A little grainy but still able to watch. Chalk one up to the analog fans out there to see an actual analog that once was sign back on again.
 
Re: K25FW-D came up in a recent channel add scan

I did a channel add scan tonight and K25FW-D was picked up.

Nothing transmitting, just a black screen, but enough power to register the channel.

My signal strength meter on the Sanyo LCD DP 42840 is not very helpful.

On many channels that I get sound and picture that's watchable, there are no signal strength bars registered.

My test channel is KMPX Ch. 29, where I get three bars.

My next big screen TV will have better OTA features, than that crappy Sanyo, which always defaults to static channel 3, after the TV has been turned off (not unplugged, just powered off.)
 
Re: K25FW-D came up in a recent channel add scan

TheRover said:
I did a channel add scan tonight and K25FW-D was picked up.

Nothing transmitting, just a black screen, but enough power to register the channel.
Click to expand...

Who knows? That may turn out to be the most interesting programming they've had on the station. :)
 
Re: K25FW-D came up in a recent channel add scan

dhett said:
TheRover said:
I did a channel add scan tonight and K25FW-D was picked up.

Nothing transmitting, just a black screen, but enough power to register the channel.
Click to expand...

Who knows? That may turn out to be the most interesting programming they've had on the station. :)
Click to expand...

Well, back in the days of analog, when I was much much younger, I sometimes, late at night, in a darkened room, looked intently into the static of the signed off channel, to see if I could see any secret messages ....

Still waiting for that transmission ....
 
So for the past couple of days I can't seem to get KPFW channel 18. My set says "program has no content" which usually means the signal is too weak to decode. I've never had any problem getting that station.
 
Noticed the same thing. I think their signal was messed up for a couple of days. Last I checked it was back on, though.
 
tested said:
For what it's worth.. I see where KHFW Denison has applied to move to channel 4. It would be 100 watts at 67 feet with a tower near 75 and 121.. the city of license would be Dallas. (see here: http://transition.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/tvq?facid=130952 )
The coverage area (according to Trip Erickson's awesome rabbitears.info website) would be limited to McKinney and Plano.
I can't imagine why anyone would want a station like this. It may be another vaporware station that never signs on the air despite what they tell the FCC. Anyway.. it's an odd move.. if it ever fires up, I might get it.
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You might check now - the FCC granted the license on 2/8. But my guess is that it's vaporware, as you said; I expect a new application to move downtown Real Soon Now.
 
Has anyone noticed a degradation in K31GL's signal over the past week?

All I have to go by is my Philco converter box signal readings, but here are the ranges of readings I've seen:

2/17: 40-46
2/18: 36-43
2/19: 30-32
2/20 thru 2/23: 28-32 (seems to have stabilized at these lower readings)

Every other station has been fairly steady; it's just K31GL that's dropped like this. It's not bad enough to affect reception on either the Philco or the Pal DVRs, but it's now too weak to receive on my PC tuner card.

Today I tried lowering the gain on my preamp, but that just made things worse so I set it back to maximum (20 dB gain). Also tried re-orienting my antenna but that didn't help either.
 
Now that you mention it, yes. Normally has always been pretty much equal to 13.1 KERA, about "85" on my DTVPal. K31GL Now 64.
 
JHBrandt said:
Has anyone noticed a degradation in K31GL's signal over the past week?
Click to expand...

My Sencore is out on loan to a friend so my numbers comes an HD HomeRun unit. You're right. Typically the SNQ values for K31GL are in the mid 80's. But for the past 4 days, they've been varying from 68-74 on the 100 unit scale. The signal strength has remained constant in the range of 66-70 over the span I've been measuring.
 
Well at least it's not just me this time. In a way it's good news: presumably Mako will schedule service if/when they realize there's a problem. Any way to contact them to let them know something's off?

Speaking of Mako, any idea why both Punch TV on 26.2 and The Cool TV on 28.2 have been off the air all weekend? 26.2 has color bars while 28.2 has a really odd slide consisting of colored letters that spell "Q Test." Even weirder, the same things are on 34.3 and 34.4! (The infomercials on 34.3 moved to 34.2.) Mako may let actual programming drop for a while, but not those infomercials ::)
 
JHBrandt said:
Speaking of Mako, any idea why both Punch TV on 26.2 and The Cool TV on 28.2 have been off the air all weekend? 26.2 has color bars while 28.2 has a really odd slide consisting of colored letters that spell "Q Test."
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I just sent emails to TheCoolTV "info" and "tech" asking if they know they are off the air in Dallas.

Maybe they ran their course and weren't getting enough orders for the "Carol Burnett And Friends" videos so they moved on to another market? ???
 
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